The apostle Luke was not a promoter of Roman power

This poster is raising some eyebrows.  It was created by the National Association of Latino Elected Officials and sent to 7000 churches to inform Hispanics about the census and encourage them to participate. 

The National Association of Latino Clergy and Christian Leaders (NALCCL) objects, mainly for pious reasons.  "The Bible establishes clearly that we are not supposed to use the name of God or Jesus in vain for any other purposes than worshiping," said Rev. Miguel Rivera, chairman of NALCCL.

I might object too, but not for that reason.  One can use the name of God or Jesus in many acceptable and legitimate ways besides worshiping--academic study, for example, or even routine conversation.

The poster portrays the Holy Family as dutifully participating in a Roman census.  Luke says Joseph and Mary had to go to their ancestral town in order to register for it, which, in their case, was Bethlehem.  It would be undermining the over-all message of Luke, or any of the four gospels, to imply that by doing so, the Holy Family supported the Roman regime. 

It is, incidentally, somewhat unlikely that this event happened historically.  The census closest to the birth of Jesus would have been that of Quirinius in AD 6, but that was still about ten years after the time that most believe that Jesus was born.  In any case, there is no record of Roman censuses requiring a trip to one's ancestral home, which would have been an administrative and logistical nightmare. 

The census was a sign of Roman power and greed.  It was a way of getting more efficient at extracting money from the people.  Whenever any census was held in the Roman Empire, there would be resistance.  In the case of Galilee and Quirinius, the Roman Army had to come in and "restore order," which they did through widespread slaughter and terror.  Before Jesus, the most famous Galilean ever was probably Judas of Galilee, who "made his bones" during the Quirinius census revolt.

The people hated the Roman occupation.  Acts of resistance and rebellion were constantly breaking out.  In the first hundred years of Roman rule, there were at least 60 such incidents, some quite serious.  Luke refers to the census partly to make the point that Roman power jerked people like Joseph and Mary around, and made the common people dance to their tune.  One of the several reasons Jesus was popular with the common people was because they, quite correctly, saw him as a figure of resistance.

To imply, then, that the Biblical witness encourages being a dutiful little citizen of the Empire, and doing obediently all that the Empire says, is quite a bit off the mark.  There are good reasons for participating in the American census, but one of them is not because Jesus wants you to obey the government.

Comments

[Dan Hays]

Amen!

[John Petty]

Thanks!

[Andrew Prior]

Good Comment John. That poster is the kind of civic Christianity that's a disaster for the church. It's also a fascinating indication of the difference between our two countries.

You would never dream of such a poster here in Oz; it would be lampooned mercilessly by the half of the country that got the point. The other half of us would have no idea what it was about! Andrew http://churchrewired.org

[John Petty]

The poster is for use among hispanics, the majority of whom are devout Christians. I can understand what they were trying to do, which is using Jesus, Joseph, and Mary as a way of encouraging them to participate in the census. Their goal was laudable, their method not so much.